May Day celebrating

Yesterday was the Mayfaire. It's this big event put on by the Waldorf school my five year old daughter Frances goes to. The previous 2 years it was organized by the head teacher and one main other parent (on whose property it took place), and last year I signed on as general coordinator. I was a lovely affair. There were maypoles and ribbons and singing and dancing about them; musicians; games; face painting; a puppet play; a may king and queen; raffle; jump rope maker; potluck; a performance by Morris dancers; as well as rain and a gigantic puddle, which was the hit of the day. This year there was no rain and puddle. In fact, the weather was so amazing I almost wonder if that's why it came together so nicely. 

So this year: I volunteered to coordinate again since I'd done it before. However, it needed to be entirely parent-run if it was going to happen. I called a meeting of parents to see if there was enough interest to go forward, and two - TWO - people came. Thank the earth for them. We decided to cut back so it wouldn't be quite so much to do. Out went the raffle, the puppet play, the jump rope maker. The Morris dancers weren't available. In the end I could only find a queen (one of my younger babysitters), but she reigned quite well alone. 


Organizing this thing has been making me crazy. (and is one of the reasons I haven't been here on the blog at all.) I've been completely attached to my phone - fielding texts and emails and voice mails. As the coordinator, my main tasks were to bully and cajole and track down; to put out fires and grovel and wonder if I should cancel. This past Thursday the teacher - who was going to act as general MC and lead the singing and dancing - hobbled over to the doctor to be told she had a bronchitis PLUS a sinus infection PLUS an ear infection in BOTH ears. I almost hyperventilated. 


BUT! It was so wonderful! It all (somehow) just came together. YAY!


Today I woke up tired. I feel like I haven't slept in a week, which I have. I knew I was stressed about it, and I knew it was taking up a (very) large portion of my waking hours, but I didn't see the tiredness coming. Relief. I knew there'd be relief, and there certainly is. 


This is Frances's last year at the school, but Clark will start there in the fall, so (sort of) by default I'll be doing it again next year. Oh my. Hopefully I've got it down now. And hopefully I will believe that his can come together without so much damn stress. 

easter chocolate sugar kids

I've read parenting books that say studies show sugar doesn't affect children's behavior. They say you should just let them self regulate, and I can't help but think


Have you never been around children??

We let the kids eat as much as they want on easter and halloween. I mean, I remember the glory of incredible indulgence, handfuls of little foil wrapped eggs; I remember that joy. I would hate to deprive them of that. But also - I want them to be able to connect the effects and their bodies. It's amazing how unaware of our bodies we can be. So sure; why not? Let them feel the glorious high of waaaaaayy too much sugar, and feel the crash of it too.

Yesterday we couldn't completely send them to the wolves, so we did force a cheese stick upon each before we let them descend upon their baskets. And I made them drink whole milk (glass after glass, good grief) as they downed their chocolates. There were a few jelly beans but if you're gonna go all out with a huge juicy mouthful of some kind of candy, I'm a firm believer that it really should be chocolate. I did get pastel peanut M&Ms in an attempt to counter the sugar with peanut protein. (In retrospect, I'd say that's like tossing pebbles into the grand canyon.) Clark ate his entire chocolate bunny before 7 am. It was about 7:30 when Frances said, "My tummy doesn't feel so good," and I hugged her and said, "I bet it doesn't." That girl loves sweets.

I hope it pays off in the end. Meantime, we spent a good bit of Sunday afternoon contending with meltdowns. They weren't so bad. A little loud, and somewhat frustrating, but not so bad. We were with a great big family who lovingly included us in their midday feast and one of the major meltdowns involved the four year old's wanting to be the one up to kick in the kickball game though his team was in the outfield.

It's tragic, being a child.

Point is: sugar makes for mini disasters. Anyone who wants proof of this is welcome to join us this halloween.

Not only that. Clark woke last night in a complete panic about an hour after bedtime, some kind of night terror. Poor guy. He was shaking and didn't at first even want me to hold him. I turned on the light so he could see where he was, could see he was awake. It was like he was still asleep and couldn't come out of it although his eyes were open and he was looking at me. He calmed down and let me rock him, but it took him a few moments. It was the worst one he's had in a while.

Later I slept blissfully, but apparently Mitch was up with Clark two thirds of the night. (I don't really know what that was about, but I'd be willing to bet the sugar has something to do with it.)

AND eating so much easter day means less leftover for me to eat. (I really lost control yesterday over the robin's egg malt balls. Hadn't had them in years. I suspect it was a nostalgia craving because my enjoyment of them was much greater than they deserved.) PLUS right now I'm at the tail end of my botox treatment period which means my headaches are hovering these days. Bummer for me easter didn't fall soon after a treatment.... Next one is April 18 yay yay yay! And then - behold! - that coconut cream egg behind the rice milk in the pantry is mine.

By the way, the eggs above we wrapped in rubber bands before dying. Aren't they lovely? 

want

Mommy? 

I want a Spiderman costume. 

Mommy? 

I want a robot costume and a batman flashlight with a bat on it. It's a craft. 

I want a robot costume and a yoda costume and a stormtrooper costume and a spiderman costume.

Mommy? Mama!

I want a BAD robot costume. A bad one has red eyebrows and does this (fierce scowl). 

Mama?

I want a guy that transforms into a car. A yellow one. 

Mommy? 

I want a remote controlled airplane, a lego remote controlled airplane that I push a button and the wings SHOOT out whoosh. And it flies like this.

Mommy? 

I want a snowboard. I want to go swoosh fast.

Mama? 

I want goggles and a helmet and gloves. 

Mommy? 

I want a flash costume and a whole superheroland. A whole set.

sweetness

Frances has taken to calling Clark "Buddy Boy".

Yesterday she gave him 3 dollars of her own money (of which she only had about 5) to buy some Angry Bird erasers. I suggested he give her a great big thank you hug, and they threw their arms around each other and Frances kissed him on the head.

They no longer come to see us when they first wake up. Now Clark goes into his sister's room and they start right in with Baby Sam, a game where Clark is the baby and Frances is the mommy.

Today I asked Frances what I would need to know if I were going to play Baby Sam, and she said they always go on the carousel, and it's his birthday every day, and they have either cake or cupcakes.

Here's the prayer she said last night before bed:

Dear Sun, thank you for the light in the morning. 

Dear Moon, thank you for the light in the night. 

Dear God, thank you for this life and all the happiness. 

superhero cake!

I didn't use fondant because I think it tastes horrible, so it's just confectioner sugar frosting. I got it so smooth by dipping a palate knife in hot water and smoothing it over. Worked pretty well. That's royal frosting on the hershey bars for windows. I tried to use melted white chocolate but it just melted the hershey bars. Royal frosting is amazing stuff - it will do just about anything. It even worked for mortar on the broken hershey bars - you can see one on the far side of the cake. 

Superman on top, Batman and Robin guarding the buildings below.

Red, blue, yellow insides! Very exciting. 

Sweet four year old birthday boy. 

cake on the way

Clark will be four in a couple of days. He is adorable and very difficult these days, and he makes me crazy. But it's a much lighter version of crazy than I used to have parenting them. It's colored with more humor. I'm definitely better cut out for young children rather than babies. I did not wear sleep deprivation well. BUT ALSO, my headaches.... It is no little deal that I have found a sort of solution for my headaches. I never thought I'd visit this mountain, frankly, but for a solid month after I have a botox treatment I not only have no headaches but also can eat ANYTHING. It's heaven. Chocolate chocolate chocolate. And peanut butter is WAAAAY better than I remembered.

So Saturday is the party, which means I'm elbow deep in cake making. I do love the creative release of a crazy cake every 6 months (how handy of them to have spread out their birthdays!) but the focus I give it means I sort of forget I have an actual party to plan. And then the party is upon me and all I want to do is shape chocolate into rocks or turrets or skyscrapers (as it happens to be this year) but I'm overcome with anxiety because I can't seem to remember to buy the plates.

One day. One day I will just make a regular cake with regular frosting. But for now - for the magic time of four year olds - there are buildings and sky and superman, and how much fun is that??

hello there!

I don't know why I've been absent here so long. I do have excuses, though they're not interesting enough to share. Mostly, I think, my creative outlets have shifted to material production - like baking the crazy biannual birthday cake. Or these balls I sewed from old sweaters. (Aren't they cute? I was so tired of telling Clark not to throw things in the house and decided he needed something he was allowed to throw. The green and gray one was for him. Then Frances wanted one (left). Hers has embroidery from a kit she was working on while I made the balls. The one on the right is for our favorite 2 year old. She loved Clark's ball when she was here last, and she happens to be having a birthday this week. Frances did the embroidery on that one freehand, and it was her idea to write with a fabric pen on the heart. The little one was just cuz. I'm doing one more for the birthday gift, and I need to find a bell to put in it. I've got one around here somewhere.)

I've been reading old posts, ones like this and this, mostly when Clark was a year to a year and a half, and Frances was 2 and a half to three. It was like living with two wild animals. No wonder I was out of my mind. Things are so different now, calmer, more sane. I can take my eyes off my children to do things like shower or have the stomach flu. A couple of weeks ago when I was horribly ill I even napped while they were awake and playing in the house. A new world!

I've also been reading these old posts to Frances, like this one and this one. She thinks these stories about herself are hilarious. "More, more!" she says. It's the first time I've read any of the blog to the kids; I saw for the first time the weight of this thing in their lives that I've created, this record of their babydom, something they are going to be able to have. Until now I hadn't thought about it much. More, I've thought about the depression and frustration the honesty with which I've written here. I've thought of how I will feel about their reading that. (I feel okay about it, by the way.)

So it was lovely, reading to her. She was a funny (and intense) toddler. One of the posts mentioned something about a 'stage', and Frances asked what a stage is. I answered the question, then told her some stages are good and some are not so good. Then she said, "I'm in a really good stage right now, right Mama?" "Yes, that's true. You're really fun to be around right now," I said. "And Clark's in not such a good stage," she said. "Also true," I admitted. You can't argue with the girl.

one of each

Here's what I overhear verbatim while washing dishes after making chili this afternoon.

(Girl Child - age 5yrs 5mo
Boy Child - age 3yrs 11mo.)

They make me think of two different productions sharing the same actors lot. Frances and Clark use each other as placeholders, warm bodies, almost like the other isn't speaking at all. Can you tell who is who?


Do you want to buy some cake? I also have lovely muffins. What would you like?

Pretend she's flying over the town and then she turns into a monster.

Do you want a wedding cake or a beautiful birthday cake?

I used to be a princess but now I'm a mermaid who swims underwater fast. I do go to a lot of weddings.

So a wedding cake, then?

Yeah, a wedding cake.

You can sit right here at this table and eat your cake. Would you like a piece of birthday cake too?

And then the city got swept up. Sheblam!

truth telling

Have you read this blog yet? It's just recently gone viral. I've been sent links to it a couple of times but only recently explored past those specific posts. It's got me thinking. Thinking about my purpose as a mom, as a human, and about the purpose of this here blog of my own. Because the truth telling issue (as in this post) is the point of my blog too. I believe that truth telling can be revolutionary. When I started the blog it was because, as a new mom, I felt SO MUCH PRESSURE to feel specific things ("Isn't it WONDERFUL? Don't you just LOVE being a mom?") and some of them, dammit, I wasn't feeling. Sometimes I didn't just love it, sometimes I felt exhausted and overwhelmed and trapped. And doomed. It's a sinking feeling, doom. There's no air there. And when I expressed these feelings out loud, other moms opened their eyes wide in shock that I would dare utter it, and then they nodded and shared their feelings of doom too, and their feelings of inadequacy for feeling doomed in the first place. Like something was wrong with them, with us, for not feeling what we were "supposed" to be feeling a hundred percent of the time.

I decided it needed saying, the truth. I needed to explore how to do this seemingly impossible mom thing. There was some time, early on when I had a smidge of postpartum depression, when I worried I simply did not have the stamina to do it, to be a mom. Where would I get the inner resources? But they're there; they're there. Sometimes the way is dark and foggy, and it's frightening.

But lately I feel the blog has stalled. My babies aren't babies anymore; they're little children now. And dealing with them takes different resources, ones I'm not sure I'm able to convey well here. Now, instead of exhaustion and spit up and exploding diapers, we have relationships. Relationships by their very nature are complicated. When you have relationships rather than techniques, the issues become the realm of fiction, of poetry and rhyme. Only, I'm not in the fiction writing business these days. (Though, you may or may not know, that is my degree: fiction writing. Still, I'm out of the business for now.)

So what does this blog mean to me now? What is its purpose? And - one big thing - do I still tell the truth here? Sometimes I don't. My friend Erynn calls me when I go too long between posts, because she knows that means I'm not doing so well. During those times, often my mom experiences are ones I don't want to write about. When I scream hysterically at my kids, when I completely lose my patience, when I feel like the job I'm doing is not good enough. But maybe they are exactly the ones I should be writing about. I don't know.

Like last Sunday. Mitch and I had an argument the night before and then Sunday morning he left for work. I don't know why it undid me so, but it did. I spent most of the morning trying not to cry, then thought going out in the world would help, so I loaded everyone up in the car. The kids were just being themselves, not overly loud but certainly not quiet; laughing and playing as they waited for me in their seats, but it was too much for me. As I got in the car Clark said, "MAMA! CAN YOU TURN ON THE KID MUSIC?" and I just lost control of myself. I spun around like a complete crazy person and shrieked "NO! I CANNOT! I CANNOT TURN ON THE KID MUSIC! I CANNOT!!!" then immediately got out of the car and burst into tears. But not before I saw the looks on their faces.

After such behavior on my part, there's so much self loathing. I'm a bad mom, I'm a bad human, I don't know how to function in basic social ways, how can I possibly be allowed to be in charge of other small helpless humans? I'm supposed to be teaching (modeling!) them how to behave in this world, forcryingoutloud.

So there it is. The things I'm dealing with these days. And even when I'm not publishing here, I'm still writing. Often writing and then deleting, or writing but never publishing. Or at least thinking about writing even when I instead play yet another game of Bejeweled Blitz. I've gotten it together enough that I'm not bursting into tears daily, thank goodness.

The same blog listed above has another post that I can't put my finger on right now, but in it she talks about what she calls "mommy meltdown", a dramatic bout of weeping in which you complain that you just can't take it anymoooore. In her house, she claims, it happens about once a week. I do not have mommy meltdowns. I simply feel overwhelmed and it builds in me and builds in me until it bursts out in anger, sometimes actual rage, or at least certainty (and then some form of pathetic resignation) that my life is horrible and I'm trapped in it forever. Then I remember the families I saw in huts in India last summer, which just makes me feel spoiled but no less depressed or trapped. What occurs to me now is that a mommy meltdown could be just the thing I need. If I had a weekly release of melodrama in the form of tears I could possibly avoid the rage that I generally direct at my family, poor undeserving creatures that they are. I always fear my rage does immeasurable damage to my children, but Mitch feels it does not; its damage will come in the deterioration of my relationship with the kids. And THAT thought makes me sad beyond measure.

I wonder if I can implement regular meltdowns, perhaps schedule them in. Country music may have to be involved. Oh, and here's the blog post I mention above - found it. 

2011 in 6 minutes

I forgot to post our holiday video here.... I sent it out to our friends and family, and here it is for my online friends too. Enjoy!


Happy Holidays 2011 from cali lovett on Vimeo.